MRS. WIMBUSH'S REVENGE.

(Concluded from last week.)

It was a large picnic party. Mr. Charles Brookshank had drawn Mrs. Wimbush's arm through his own, and strolled away from the rest.

"How delightful it would be if one could know the language of birds, as folks did in the old Hindu fairy tales! Would it not, Mr. Brookshank?"

"My dear Mrs. Wimbush, they do nothing the whole day long but make love and cry 'Sweet, sweet!' I would I were a bird, to make love in music."

The widow sighed, but it was more like a purr of pleasure.

"What did I know of love till you came here?" continued Mr. Charles. "Absolutely nothing—except," he added, with reservation, "in a professional way. And then we lawyers generally see the dark side of the picture—the damages and the decrees nisi. But your visit has brightened my whole life. O Mrs. Wimbush, you can not have been blind to my secret! You have seen it written legibly in my face, and have not interposed to check its development. I see you understand me, just as by intuitive fine feeling you can penetrate the meaning of Mendelssohn's Songs without Words. Mrs. Wimbush, you have already far advanced toward learning the birds' language. I may rely upon your consent?"

"Charles, this happiness is indeed too much," ejaculated the widow.

"You need never be separated from your daughter Carry. A home for one is a home for both; and I will cherish her while I live."

"But, Charles dear, she may marry."

"Marry, ma'am? Bless my soul, of course she will! She will marry me! She has said so, don't you see?"

Mrs. Wimbush never said another word, but fell flat down upon the grass.

"What on earth has got the woman?" thought Mr. Charles. "She couldn't have taken it worse if I had proposed to murder her daughter."

In their walk they had strayed through the trees close to the outskirts of another picnic party. Mr. Charles immediately ran to ask some fair volunteer to come to the assistance of Mrs. Wimbush, who had fainted. At hearing the name, an active middle-aged lady sprang up and followed him. It was Mrs. Marrables. The sight of her mother brought Mrs. Wimbush round quicker than any smelling bottle could have done. She sat up.

"Mother, Mr. Brookshank; Mr. Brookshank, my mother, Mrs. Marrables." They bowed. "Have the goodness to leave us together, Mr. Charles." He bowed and obeyed. "Mother," said Mrs. Wimbush, "what on earth brought you here? I thought you were at Taunton."

"No, dear. I have been at Bournemouth three weeks, I came merely for change. Only last week I heard of your being here, and should have called, but have been so much occupied, and I felt sure of meeting you somewhere, and thought the surprise might be the more agreeable. We've had a most delightful picnic with the Mount Stewart folks. But what was all this fainting about? One would think Mr. Brookshank had been proposing to you."

"He certainly made me a proposal mother, but I was quite unprepared for it, and was overcome."

"What an imaginative and sensitive-minded girl you must be, Matilda! You make me feel quite young. When will you be old enough to attend to business? You will accept him, of course? Well, do as you please; you may reckon on my consent, you know. But I must get back to my party, and perhaps you had better rejoin yours. Ta-ta."

Jilted for her daughter! It wasn't pleasant. When Mrs. Wimbush got home, she blew up Carry for being so sly.

"Well, mamma," said Carry, "of course I thought you knew all about it. I never made any secret of the affair. I knew very well that you had rejected Mr. Tom, but I could not possibly suppose that was any reason why I should refuse Charles. Of course he is older than I am, but he is only five-and-thirty, and has a good position; and I am sure we shall always give you a welcome; Charles said so."

"Well," thought Mrs. Wimbush, "he has money, and it will be all in the family; that's at least a comfort."

The effect of the little episode of the last chapter was that the brothers were made friends, and Tom recovered his spirits, and could laugh heartily at what he had before supposed was his brother's rivalry.

Mrs. Wimbush repented her that she had rejected Mr. Tom. Her repentance produced a salutary desire on her part to make atonement for the past. She would have him yet. When a widow says so much as that about a man, let him 'ware hawk.

A month went by, and behold Mrs Wimbush and Mr. Tom Brookshank seated tete-a-tete at an evening party, where the music which was going on was sufficiently loud to render private conversation inaudible save to those to whom it was addressed.

"I fear," said the widow, affecting an absent manner, "I treated you very unkindly, Mr. Tom. You took me so entirely by surprise, that, really, I—hardly know what I said. I have been very unhappy about it—very."

"Forgotten and forgiven," whispered Mr. Tom.

"How generous of you! you make me so glad! because now that your brother Charles is going to marry my daughter, we shall be in some sort related, and I could not bear you to think unkindly of me."

"No," said Mr. Tom, fidgeting a little, "I shall never do that."

"How droll!" said the widow. "Let me see, what will the relationship be? You will be my son-in-law's brother, and consequently I shall be your mother-in-law once removed. You will have a mother younger than yourself, Mr. Tom. I hope you will not presume upon her youth to be a bad boy."

"All this is very true," he answered; "but I see the relationship in a far different light. I shall be your father-in-law, and consequently my own brother's grandfather-in-law."

"You mistake, Mr. Tom. Don't you see that Carry—"

"No mistake at all about it, ma'am, for I've promised to marry your mother, Mrs. Marrables!"

"Monster!" cried Mrs. Wimbush aloud, and went off shrieking.

The music stopped, and there was a great fuss. But above all the others was heard the voice of Mrs. Marrables. "Don't be alarmed, pray. She is subject to it; she went off just like that the other day at a picnic. Poor young thing, a very little upsets her. Let me come to my little gu-url, then."

They moved her into another room. Presently Mrs. Wimbush opened her eyes. "Mother! how dare you come near me! Go away, do! You ought to be ashamed of yourself, at your time of life!"

"My time of life! Why, I'm only fifty-four—about ten years older than Tom. How can you talk so to your mother!"

"Mother, if you don't leave the room, I will. It's really disreputable to have you for a mother. You've never done me any credit."

"My dear, I am so glad to think you feel well enough to leave the room that I will remain."

Mrs. Wimbush got up and went home.

Jilted, first for her daughter, and next for her mother! This was too much. Mrs. Wimbush went to church as regularly as any one, but revenge, after all, is very sweet.

Six weeks afterward Mrs. Wimbush recovered sufficient fortitude to go and call on her mother.

"Well, child, I'm glad you are going to be friendly; there is nothing like harmony in a family circle. Let us consider the relationships into which we are about to enter, that we may rightly judge of our responsibilities and duties. I and my granddaughter are going to marry two brothers—the consequence is, she and I will be sisters-in-law. But as you are mother of my sister-in-law, you will nearly be my mother-in-law, which is a very singular relationship for a daughter to sustain toward her mother, especially when she is not the wife of one's father-in-law. Now, as"—

"Wait a moment, dear mamma; I've news for you; I'm going to marry old Unguent! Old Mr. Brookshank has asked me to be his wife, and I've consented. The consequence is, I shall be head of the family, and bona-fide mother-in-law to you all. I don't think we need trouble about harmony, for we shall be a united family, more so than any I know of."

Before her marriage, Mrs. Marrables set to work to draw up a table of the relationships involved by the three weddings. It is an extensive work in three volumes, and when our readers see The Brookshank Family advertised, they will know what it means.

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